


Duty Calls

by HopefulNebula



Category: X-Men (Movieverse)
Genre: Bechdel Test Pass, Comic Book Time, Conspiracy Theories, Gen, Internet, Message Boards, Mutant Hate, Mutants, POV Third Person Limited, Past Tense, Slice of Life, teenagers being teenagers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-31
Updated: 2017-03-31
Packaged: 2018-10-13 09:16:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,157
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10510800
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HopefulNebula/pseuds/HopefulNebula
Summary: Someone is wrong on the Internet. A few thousand someones, in fact.Kitty discovers this the hard way one night when she's supposed to be doing homework.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [VampirePaladin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/VampirePaladin/gifts).



> Takes place sometime between the first two (original timeline) X-Men movies; I fudged timelines/universes a bit because Negasonic was just too perfect to leave out.
> 
> This is dedicated to everybody who's ever worked to be less wrong than they used to be.

"Oh. My. God."

There weren’t many students in the Xavier School computer lab at this hour -- just Kitty herself, Bobby, Rogue, and Negasonic -- but they all stopped their work at Kitty’s pronouncement. Before any of them could ask what was up, she continued:

"Who invented the Internet? It wasn’t really Al Gore, was it? Because if it was, I’m going to find him and... and smack him upside the head or something, I don’t know--"

"Kitty."

" _What_ , Bobby?"

"Why not just _show us_ what has you so angry?"

"Because they're _stupid_. And they're _wrong_."

"So spread the love, already!" Negasonic said, scooting her chair closer to Kitty and reading over her shoulder. "...Oh my God."

"Right? I told you so."

"Actually, you didn't tell us anything." By now, Rogue and Bobby had squeezed into the space behind Kitty.

"What _is_ this and how did you find it?" asked Rogue.

"So you know that assignment for Dr. Grey's civics class?" The others nodded, so Kitty continued. "I was searching for 'mutant issues and current events' and this is the message board that came up. _This_." She gestured futilely at the screen, as if her hands could make the words change or the people who wrote them any smarter.

"'Mutants in the government'," Rogue read out loud. "'Mutants in sports.' 'Mutants throughout history.' Okay then. 'Mutant... assassinations'? 'Secret mutant city under Denver International Airport'? What on earth?"

"The entire board is like this. There's, like, fifty thousand posts."

Bobby pointed at the screen. "Ooh, click that one." Kitty did.  


> **SECRET MUTANT COLONY ON MARS????**

  
"I wish," Negasonic said. "We could send Siryn there when she snores."  


> How convenient is it that we 'lost' a bajillion-dollar space probe at the same time as the president started getting soft on mutants?

  
"Soft?" Kitty asked. "Mr. 'Mutant Management' McKenna?"

"They mean the guy before him," Rogue replied. "It was years ago when NASA lost it." When the others all looked at her, she continued: "What? My seventh grade math teacher taught us about it when he got sick of us forgettin' our labels."  


> Come on. NOBODY is so stupid that they wouldn't check their measurement units. Doesn't it make more sense that the government is hiding something?
> 
> I've heard of mutants who can suck the air right out of a room, or flood it with pure O2. They can control the weather. They can even control gravity! If we were going to send a mission to Mars, wouldn't it make sense to send a team to make it easier for the real people later on?

  
"So we're, what, fake people now?" Rogue asked, and Bobby rested a hand on her shoulder. Negasonic just rolled her eyes.  


> Why not send a fake 'orbiter' full of useful mutants to pave the way, and 'lose' it along the way? If it fails, no harm no foul, and if it succeeds, NASA can use the 'evidence of life' to secure funding for decades to come.

  
Kitty decided she'd had enough of that one. She hit the "back" button, to much protest from the peanut gallery. At least now that the initial shock had faded, she could see the humor in some of these. A lot of them seemed to just be mutant-y retreads of the classics, though. Like the one claiming fluoridated water was a secret plot to turn everyone into mutants. She ignored that one and clicked onto one that seemed new.  


> **ARE MUTANTS SECRETLY ALIENS?**

  
("Why," Bobby asked, "do people always assume anything they don't understand is aliens?"

"Nah, sometimes it's robots. Or lizard people," Kitty replied.)  


> Everyone insists the mutants aren't human. If they're really 'Homo superior' and we're like Neanderthals to them, then they're right. But evolution doesn't work that way!

  
("Except when it does," Negasonic muttered. Kitty agreed. Some people clearly didn't pay enough attention in school.)  


> If the so-called 'X-gene' is so new, mutants should be concentrated in one general part of the world. But the mutant population is exploding everywhere at once. The first of these mutants may have been from another planet. It'd make sense for aliens to want to take over slowly, inserting their genes into the dominant species' pool until we're outnumbered and overpowered.
> 
> This way they can shape the world as they see fit. They can make the changes they want to, and when the time comes they can just move in and nobody would care!

  
Rogue rolled her eyes. "I get the feelin' that this guy does a lot of moochin' off people himself," she said. "Try the next one."

That "next one" had quite a familiar name attached.  


> **SENATOR ROBERT KELLY UNDER MUTANT MIND CONTROL!**

  
She clicked. How could she not? _Screw_ her better judgement.

This one had a timeline, written in excruciating detail, of Kelly's speeches and votes, his comings and goings, and his sudden change of heart.

There were photos comparing his appearance before the failure of the Mutant Registration Act ("back when he looked like a real Senator") and after ("why does he always look distracted?"). There was speculation about his aide's mysterious death. If Kelly weren't a public figure, this would count as stalking.

Kitty could feel Rogue tense behind her. "Oh God, Rogue, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to--"

"No, it's okay. I'm okay."

She went back to the main forum page anyway. Kitty may not have been at Liberty Island, but she'd seen its aftermath, and what it had done to Rogue in particular. She _still_ didn't know the entire story, and wasn't sure she wanted to. Regardless, seeing it written here, so right but so _wrong_ , unnerved her more than she'd expected.

She scrolled a little further, but before anything else caught her eye, a voice came from behind them.

"That doesn't look like my Civics project."

"Dr. Grey! It's just that we were researching, and--"

"And Cypher must have disabled the filtering software again. We block that board for a _reason_."

Kitty was beginning to understand the wisdom of that decision.

"You're not in trouble," Dr. Grey continued. "But we don't want you to end up hating yourselves, which is what happens when mutants spend too much time there. Or you end up resenting humans for coming up with garbage like that. It isn't healthy, for you or for them." The students nodded. "Now, why don't you tell me the topics you picked for your assignment and I can help you with the research?"

Kitty nodded. The others went back to whatever they'd been doing before.

As she backbuttoned out of the message board entirely, Dr. Grey's words took root in her mind. She wasn't going to say it out loud, not just then and not in front of the others, but at that moment, Kitty resolved to ask what it would take to get cleared to start going on missions.

It was the least she could do, as long as that board was around.

**Author's Note:**

> A couple of these theories are based on real-life events/places. NASA really did lose the Mars Climate Orbiter due to some metric-vs-imperial miscommunication between them and Lockheed, and the conspiracy theories surrounding Denver International Airport are numerous (and spurred on by the glorious trolls in charge of DEN's social media accounts).
> 
> A further note: I kind of mix X-Men codenames and wallet names here, because I see a lot of codeswitching going on among the kids. So if Rogue doesn't want to be called Marie at school, but Iceman is fine being called Bobby when he's not doing mutant things, who am I as a writer to judge them? ;)


End file.
